You have to factor in the lack of emb*ggerance and hassle.
Electric wins hands down.
It's clean, it's safe, it's efficient, and it works.
If your home is properly insulated/double glazed then it's thermally efficient and electric heating doesn't need additional airflow to ensure that you don't suffocate or breathe in toxic fumes, or the fire and boiler burn cleanly, and you don't need a corgi engineer to hook you up either.
Cost comparison's aren't fixed…..just change supplier and the prices drop, and it's easy to do nowadays. The companies aren't loyal to you, you don't owe them anything except the prompt payment for the electricity you use.
Electric heating is also mobile….as in you can change the configuration of the home with ease. So the radiator/storage heater/fireplace that suits where it is in Winter time can be easily stored out of the way to make room for a Summer lay out….plants on windowsills and the like as well as open doors and wide spaces for family gatherings. Easy to re-decorate or change rooms around too.
If you can put in underfloor heating, properly insulated below, then it's brilliant
but, and it's a big but, it's not an instant heat. It's a lovely (appreciate the floor
sprawl out on rugs/floor quilts/beanbags, etc.,) gentle warmth slowly diffusing throughout the room. I would keep a radiant fire too, just for when coming in and everyone's chilled, or it's a miserable dreich night and it's late on and you don't want a hot house going to bed soon, but just a wee heat while you wind down. Ours isn't on often, but it's a pleasure just for that instant heating.
I've been eyeing up electric skirting board radiators. It's expensive to install, but it's just so tidy, so neat and unintrusive. Very tempted.
Himself believes that all gas should be pumped to the power stations and turned into electricity. We have a gas boiler for our radiators, and it's a pain of a thing to mind. It needs serviced, cleaned, primed, etc., etc.,
When it dies we're having electricity.
Our shower is electric, but I believe it could be expensive to heat the water for three or four baths a day using electricity. We just shower, so it's not an issue.
The washing machine is electric, so is the cooker. I wouldn't have gas now, and I don't care what the folks claim about it being slow to heat up and cool down, it's very good and it quickly becomes normal. You can't switch off a campfire either, so gas is the anomally, not the electric
The whole clean and easy wins hands down for me. I have lived with the fireplace being the only source of heat and hot water. It quickly becomes drudgery. Day in day out, spring, summer, autumn and winter, every single day in life. If you don't do it, the house is cold, lifeless, and even washing isn't easy.
Modern life means folks don't have hours to spend cleaning, feeding, dealing with coal, soot and ash.
I would like the potential to have a real fire, but I do not want to have only a 'real' fire. I like the one I switch on
Price wise ? I don't know. I do know that when all the other factors are taken into account though, that I think electricity wins.
There are also government funds available for solar powered installation on roofs. The trickle of money back supposedly offsets the costs and leaves a small profit….that helps pay the electricity bill
M
